How We Can Help You

What if you had board members and other volunteers not just willing - but actually wanting - to raise friends and funds for your organization?

What if you had donors who were not only compelled to by your cause - but also wanted to partner with you for your organization's ongoing success?

Welcome to Passion Driven Fundraising™

In addition to applying her vast experience and personal fundraising toolkit, Gail also applies cutting edge techniques borrowed from for-profit leadership development, viral marketing and branding, organizational development, facilitation and team building to help you move your organization from inspiration to action and FUNDRAISING RESULTS.

Her Passion Driven Fundraising™ techniques go beyond traditional fundraising to spark new energy and commitment from board members, staff members, volunteers, prospective donors and longstanding supporters. She goes deeper into your organization's culture to create permanent, sustainable change in the fundraising program and generate long term enthusiasm for your cause.

Capital Campaigns - how we can help you reach and exceed your campaign goals
Annual Fund and Major Gifts - we can help you overhaul your annual fundraising program to bring in much more money
Retreats and Board Training - find out about Gail's internationally popular "Fired-Up For Fundraising" board retreat
Speaking and Seminars - find out how Gail can pack the room at your conference and fire up your audience with new passion and excitement to change the world

Capital Campaigns

Pre-Capital Campaign:

Envision Your Future: Strategic Planning that Focuses on Results
We lead an organization through the vision-building process and come out with a tactical action plan and assigned responsibilities. And, we keep you on track over time with an organizational "dashboard" of key indicators so you know how you're progressing. Strategic planning can take the form of a one-time board retreat or can be a longer term, more thorough process involving your constituencies.

Survey Your Market: Campaign Planning Feasibility Studies
When the stakes are high, testing the market before you launch a major campaign is a vital preparatory step. Our progressive techniques involve both focus groups and individual interviews with potential donors to pre-sell prospects on your campaign. We give you a blueprint for success: where the money will be and how to go after it, what turns donors on about your cause and what they think of your organization, and what are the correct steps to launch a successful capital campaign.

Plan From the Inside Out: Organizational Development and Preparation

A capital campaign will require all players in your organization's leadership to be in alignment and agreement about your future. Our organizational development gurus help establish communications and decision-making processes that keep everyone happy and minimize the growing pains and "people issues" that can keep an organization from achieving its real potential.

Assess your Needs: The Development Office Audit

You're poised to start your capital campaign, but are you really ready? We give you best practices, strategies, tools and recommendations to improve your internal fundraising capabilities and be positioned for success. We let you know what it will take - from staff to resources to volunteer involvement - to raise your fundraising program to a new level.

Fire up Your Board: A Training Retreat Just for your Board Members

Our popular, high-energy training for board members takes the fear out of fundraising. All board members find a role to support fundraising where they can be productive, happy and comfortable. You emerge with a re-committed, re-energized board, ready to go to work to make the campaign a smashing success. Learn More.

Create a Campaign that Sizzles: Messaging Development

How do you sell something that can't be seen, heard or touched? That's the challenge every nonprofit faces in creating a compelling reason for donors to support their organization. Drawing from principles of corporate branding and marketing, our strategic experts and writers help you cut through the clutter to uncover your unique story and leverage it for a campaign case statement, elevator speech, talking points and support collateral that inspire your donors to act.

Capital Campaign:

Guide the Course: Campaign Counsel for Ongoing Success
We offer expert guidance to ensure that you reach your campaign goals, including recruitment of dynamic campaign leadership and strategic development to bring in top-level gifts and contributions.

Fire up Your Volunteers: Campaign Volunteer Training

Do your volunteers know how to talk up your campaign, cultivate prospects and most of all, graciously solicit a major campaign gift? We offer fun, stimulating training sessions that create volunteers who emerge with excitement, ready to pile new supporters onto your organization's bandwagon.

Invigorate your Campaign: Mid-Campaign Assessment and Overhaul

Has your capital campaign lost its steam? Is volunteer energy sagging? Our techniques to enlist new campaign leadership, reorganize your campaign cabinet and re-energize your volunteers will provide fresh energy and momentum. Pep up your campaign with vigorous strategies designed to bring in six or seven-figure gifts!

Annual Fund and Major Gifts

Annual Giving: Overhaul Your Fundraising Program
What would it take to double your annual fundraising results? Our team can apply best practices to all areas of your annual fund, including direct mail, thank-you processes, events, data base management, corporate sponsorships, grants, and on-line fundraising. And, we bring board members into the fundraising process to make them full partners in your fund development program. You emerge with a more powerful fundraising program and active buy-in from your board that will raise much more money.

Major Gifts: Going for the Gold
Don't leave money on the table every year because you don't have a Major Gifts program. Every organization should, at all times, have 10-20 prospects they are cultivating for a major gift. Our team can help you identify your foremost prospects, and craft cultivation strategies to bring them closer to your organization. Best of all, we can engage your board members as ambassadors to nurture long-term relationships with your prospects.

Grant writing: Research & Proposals Designed to Win
Our experienced grant writing team can offer comprehensive grant research through a variety of on-line search engines and e-news lists. Our team can help create a master proposal for your organization, and then tailor it for specific funding requests.

We believe that successful grantsmanship, like all fundraising, requires face time with prospective funders in order to develop an ongoing relationship. We coach our clients on how to develop personal relationships with prospective funders, even if they are thousands of miles away. We use the subtle skills developed from decades of fundraising to help create winning proposals that will bring in hundreds of thousands of dollars in grant funding.

Board Training and Retreats

Fundraising Training for Board Members

Our popular, high-energy training for board members takes the fear out of fundraising, creating board members not just willing - but actually wanting - to participate! Gail Perry helps each board member find the right role where he or she can be happy, comfortable and productive. Board training can take the form of our flagship seminar, "Fired-Up for Fundraising," as well as customized retreats or special sessions adapted to your board meeting format.

Board Roles and Responsibilities Training

Take your board to a new level with a refreshing session on board effectiveness. We can reinvigorate your board, helping each member find the ideal role, build new skills and contribute personal vision to your organization. We create deeper discussions about your organization's and your board's purpose, and get your board members on track to stay engaged for the long haul. Nonprofit leaders may also be interested pairing this board training with Gail's session, Your Dream Team Board: From Recruiting to Revitalizing.

Board Facilitation

Have a thorny subject or urgent matter to resolve? We can help set up a productive discussion designed to encourage dialogue and reach consensus among a divided board. Our organizational development experts can help you create a more closely knit board with a new level of collegiality and commitment.

Governmental Relations and Lobbying

Significant government appropriations are awarded to nonprofits each year. Is your organization getting its share? Gail Perry Associates has participated in securing millions of dollars from local, state and federal sources for our clients, specializing in cultivating relationships with elected officials and developing political strategies. Gail Perry is a registered lobbyist in North Carolina, has been active in the state political scene for over twenty years and has political ties at all levels of the governmental sector. When needed, we can also tap a broad network of other lobbyists with expertise in particular interest areas.

Executive Coaching

The pressure and demands on nonprofit leaders are significant. But, formalized support is rare. Gail Perry brings over two decades of nonprofit experience together with training as a business coach to give nonprofit executives a safe sounding board to solve problems, make decisions, set goals and develop action plans. She works directly with clients as they put their plans into practice, helping them to work through challenges and obstacles, and address the ongoing struggle to balance work and personal lives.

Speaking and Seminars

Need some inspiration? Gail Perry brings her wit and warmth to large-group settings.

From keynote addresses to special seminars, Gail delivers practical advice that can enlighten new fundraisers and reawaken veterans.

Choose from Gail's most popular topics, or have Gail customize a seminar specifically for your organization’s needs.

Keynote Address:

Passion-Driven Fundraising™: Start the Journey
Get ready to infuse a new energy into your fundraising program and inspire your volunteers with an entirely new perspective: fundraising is not about money; it’s about changing the world! Building on best practices from the business and non-profit sector, as well as her own 22-year career in professional fundraising, Gail offers a new toolkit for fundraising, including viral marketing, customer relationship management and donor-centered fundraising. Spark your supporters’ passion, and transform that energy into fundraising results!

Topics for Board Members:

Get Fired-Up for Fundraising: Especially for Board Members
Think fundraising is all about the “ASK”? Think again. In this popular session designed just for board members, Gail transforms reluctant fundraisers into individuals ready to embrace their fundraising responsibilities. Bringing to life Gail’s groundbreaking book, “Passion-Driven Fundraising: Turn Board Member Passion into Action,” which has been lauded as “the gold-standard guide for building successful boards,” this dynamic session offers clear, practical—and refreshing—steps designed to motivate, inspire and empower. Help every board member rediscover his or her vision for your organization. Find the right fundraising role for each individual. Build confidence and enthusiasm through upbeat, accessible training. Change the view of fundraising from asking for money to positively impacting the world!

Fundraising for Board Members: Get the Whole Board Involved, Productive and Happy While Supporting Fundraising
Board members: do your fellow trustees shy away from fundraising because they are nervous about "asking?" It’s time to shift perspectives and boost the bottom line. In this session designed especially for board members, Gail explores the many ways board members can support your fundraising program - without having to directly solicit. Create a game plan that will raise new money while creating stronger, deeper relationships by focusing on cultivating and thanking donors.

Topics for Non-profit Staff:

Real World Cultivation and Solicitation Strategies that WORK!
Gail puts Passion-Driven Fundraising™ into practice with cutting-edge techniques and proven strategies to identify, cultivate and solicit donors - people who want to not only help your organization today, but who also will become long-term committed partners, helping your organization to grow, meet new challenges and continue to positively impact the world. She will offer step by step techniques to develop "friend-based" relationships with potential donors, bringing them closer to your organization until they are ready to give. We will discuss ways to get the door open, how to get prospects more involved with your mission, ways to generate enthusiasm for your cause, and how to prepare them for a "big ask." Gail will outline the seven questions you need to know before you solicit your donor – and how to find the answers prior to your "ask".

Secrets to a Winning Capital Campaign
Getting ready to embark on a capital campaign? Did you know there are seven major factors that can hold back your fundraising success? Gail explores each one - and gives you a step-by-step approach to prepare for or prevent them. Plus, Gail delivers a self-assessment tool so you can objectively assess your organization's campaign readiness and determine how to lay the groundwork for positive results.

Create a Rainmaker Board of Fundraisers
Unlock your board members' passion for your mission and transform them into expert - and enthusiastic - fundraisers. Gail presents practical strategies to ignite board members’ passion and discover easy ways each individual can help raise money. Learn how to create a more active and committed board by moving each member from the fear of asking for money to the joy of making a difference.

Your Dream Team Board: From Recruiting to Revitalizing
Set up your board to win from the beginning, and keep member interest and enthusiasm for your organization alive. From establishing a high-functioning management structure and a culture of respect to enlisting and orienting the right people with the right outlook and skills to designing energetic and positive board meetings, Gail explains how to create a board in which every member embraces his or her role and stays engaged for the long haul.

See why Gail consistently packs conferences to standing-room-only crowds. Contact Kate Shepard for scheduling information.